Glasgow SANDS is an organisation which can offer you support when your baby dies during pregnancy or after birth. The death of a baby is a devastating experience. The effects of grief can be overwhelming and parents, their families and friends can be left feeling dazed, disorientated, isolated and exhausted.

It can be hard to take in information, to make decisions or to imagine how you are going to cope. At SANDS there are people who understand what it's like because many of us have been through this experience ourselves, and we are here to help offer support and information when you need it.

Support for all
The death of a baby can happen to any one of us. What brings us together in SANDS is the common experience of this painful loss. Your baby may have been stillborn or died during or soon after birth. He or she might have spent some time in a special care baby unit. It may be that your baby died at an earlier gestation or that you had to make the difficult decision to end your pregnancy. We offer support whenever a baby dies.

As well as supporting mothers and fathers, we are also able to help other members of your family, especially grandparents and other children. Many people may be touched by your baby's death, including friends and health professionals, and all are welcome to contact us for support and information.

You may not want anything from us right away. We are here to help whenever you feel you need it. That may be now or in a few weeks months or even years.

Our core aims:
SANDS is a national charity, established by bereaved parents in 1981. We have 3 core aims which are to:

Support anyone affected by the death of a baby; To work in partnership with health professionals to improve the quality of care and services offered to bereaved families; and To promote research and changes in practice that could help to reduce the loss of babies' lives

It is not our policy to make the initial contact with bereaved parents, rather we prefer parents contact us when they feel the need. We are therefore dependent on parents being referred to us by hospitals, health visitors, G.P.’s, social workers, etc. To assist with this we circulate the list of meeting dates and befriender contacts.

The befriender’s list also provides parents with a telephone contact for use in times of stress.

(Please note that all our befrienders are volunteers, and there may be times when we can not always take your call. Please leave a message and our befrienders will call you back)

Glasgow SANDS donate quarterly to the National Organisation who are working to promote research and improvements in practice which could save babies' lives.

This section contains first hand experiences written by parents and their relatives about the death of their baby, plus a selection of poems and memorials. Please click on the links to read more.

Glasgow SANDS is a charity that receives no goverment funding, all financial support comes from fundraisers and their wonderful efforts. Losing a baby not only affects the immediate family but friends and the extended family too. Find out how you can help...

Add a Memorial Page
Within the Chapel of Rest at each of the maternity hospitals across the city, and at Wishaw, Glasgow SANDS befrienders work with the staff to maintain memorial books. These leather bound books are available for all to read. For the Southern General you will need to request to view them at the maternity Hospital.

It may feel very hard to take in the reality of what has happened and to have any thoughts of what to do next. However, many parents have told us how important the memories of the short time they have with their baby are and that they have found it comforting to have reminders that they can look at and hold.

This ‘Always Loved, Never Forgotten’ memory box is given by Glasgow Sands as a way to create some memories which you can cherish.